Saturday, January 06, 2007

Excuse me while I slip into some shorts

It was 69 degrees today in Boston. This is January, in case anyone's forgotten (and I'm sure many have). The neighbor's leftover light-up snowman and reindeer look beyond ridiculous. And no one seems to be complaining, although I don't personally know any ski resort owners. So what this means is... why are we getting so worked up about Halliburton no-bid contracts and drilling for oil in the Alaskan National Wildlife Refuge? Petroleum-produced greenhouse gases RULE! Global warming? Bring it on, baby.

What it also means is that I got to give Becky a bath at 4:00 this afternoon. Why? Because the two of us took a trip to the playground where there is always a large mud puddle. And apropos of the weather, Becky was wearing shorts and sandals (though the footwear got ditched early). And Becky informed me that at her pretend school, they're learning about bunnies this week, and part of the program involved hopping like a bunny – in the mud puddle. So.

The reason that Ben and Sarah weren't along for the fun was because the two of them were visiting Ben's mistress, the focus of his obsessive love that he can't keep away from for more than a day. I refer of course to the new house. You know, the house that for which Ben did all the final drawings after firing the putzy attitudinous architect who didn't even know how to use a computer to draw plans. The one at which Ben is directing the builders at a mind-numbing level of detail. The one for whom Ben spends hours shopping online for trinkets and baubles like floor tile and large appliances and cabinets and so forth. It seems that his place of employment has a sweet 50% deal if you buy your washer, stove, etc. from one major manufacturer. So we'll be living a Subzero lifestyle on a Hotpoint budget. Anyway, he spends hours rhapsodizing about soffits and engineered joists and Soni-Tube, and I'm very happy for them both. My level of interest will ratchet up when it's time to install carpeting and figure out where the furniture is going to go.